Author: Editorial
Publication: Investor.com
Date: August 8, 2005
Immigration: Prime Minister Tony
Blair says he wants to deport those who encourage terrorism in Britain.
To which we say: It's about time.
Two terrorist attacks on London's
transportation system in one month were apparently enough. Blair wants
to round up those foreigners who incite or take part in terrorist violence
and send them back to their countries of origin.
If you're a trouble-making preacher,
you'll soon have trouble entering the U.K. And if you consort with terrorists,
or get involved in extremist groups or Web sites, you might get a one-way
ticket home.
Blair's move brought the predictable
outcries. The director of a civil rights group called Liberty warned it
would "jeopardize national unity." And the leader of the Liberal Democratic
Party, Charles Kennedy, worried it might strain what the BBC called "cross-party
consensus."
But that's just the problem. For
too many British citizens, things like "cross-party consensus" trumps terrorism
as a concern. No wonder London has come to be known as "Londonistan" -
a place where radical Muslim clerics and the shadowy political groups that
surround them are free, even welcome, to pursue hate-filled agendas.
Those who think this is a limited
problem should think again. A recent YouGov poll by the Telegraph newspaper
found that roughly 100,000 of Britain's Muslims call terrorist attacks
like those that hit London a month ago "justified."
Another 150,000 say they're "not
at all loyal" to Britain. These include thousands of young people who were
born, fed, schooled and cared for by Britain's liberal welfare state, and
who are today coddled and excused by liberal "human rights" and legal aid
groups that have made them their special cause.
Just one day before Blair's comments,
Conservative Shadow Defence Secretary Gerald Howarth created an uproar
by suggesting that those who "despise everything we stand for, despise
our values, loathe our country and do not show it any allegiance" should
think about finding "somewhere else to live."
This too proved controversial, and
Howarth was pilloried for his remarks.
Until Blair can change things, it
will remain impossible under British law to deport terrorists and their
allies. Why? Under the U.K.'s Human Rights Act, even those who entered
the country illegally can't be deported if they might be mistreated in
their home country.
So here we are, early in the 21st
century, with the West besieged by Muslim fundamentalists set on re-establishing
their medieval caliphate, and some want to look the other way - or worse,
surrender - to those who would do evil to us.
It's not just those like MP George
Galloway, who calls terrorist suicide bombers "martyrs." Or London Mayor
Ken Livingstone, who last week blamed the upsurge in terrorism on the war
in Iraq - a ridiculous assertion, given that the West was hit repeatedly
by terrorists in the years before the Iraq War.
No, it's also those who look the
other way and hope terrorism disappears. Or those like Kennedy who see
it merely as a complication of party politics - not a grave threat to our
civilization.
Nor is it a problem solely for Britain.
As we noted here recently, the U.S. is home to a number of foreign imams
and minor Muslim clerics who preach hate and terror on our own soil.
They get in under an overly generous
R-1 visa program that treats them as if they're among the lowest threat
among our 10 visa classifications. Once here, they're almost impossible
to deport.
Maybe Blair has an idea. And maybe
we'd be wise to copy it.
